Content allows you to build an audience, attract customers through opt-in (vs. the old opt-out tactics), and create advocates on behalf of your business or brand. In addition to planning for those milestones, you will need to plan content for each phase of the buyer's journey. You used to be able to "borrow" the audience media channels built. You paid to rent eyeballs and ears with TV, print, even digital, and radio advertising and promotions. They had the audience, not you. You got to interrupt it in exchange for money. In social, you can go direct to customers and prospective... Read more →

The new report from Retail Systems Research (RSR) titled The Great Leveler: eCommerce's Next Move# highlights the challenges and opportunities retailers are facing as we approach the 2013 holiday season. As I have written before, with digital technologies, the path to purchase is no longer linear, nor is it one-dimensional. Multi device ownership is a reality#. Smartphones and tablets are changing our behaviors by putting an ever-increasing abundance of options at our fingertips, including when and how to make a purchase. While we do most of our research at home on desktops or tablets, mobile devices continue to drive purchase... Read more →

Once the current challenges in navigating the health-care exchanges are sorted out#, many organizations will still need to iron out how to support the direct to buyer model. Getting into the Healthcare.gov system is a step in a multilevel game that includes questions on how to pick a plan, whether one qualifies for federal subsidies, picking doctors, precription coverage, and provider reliability. First things first -- the portal needs to be in working order, and users will need to be able to complete tasks. Starting with such a disadvantage means it will take a while for the reviews and data... Read more →

Three years ago I wondered is Twitter the news system of the future? All news that fit in a tweet Remember the Hudson River plane landing? The attacks in Mumbai? How about the California and Haiti earthquakes? Twitter is great for short news alerts, as long as we do keep vigilant about red herrings. It was 2009, and CNN lost ground to crowdsourced news. During the Fort Hood shootings, interested citizens and locals, then mainstream media publications, showed how Twitter lists can be used for breaking news and to deliver information about what is happening at the scene. News sources... Read more →

Two companies are in the news lately -- Apple (how we love to root for the underdog to then look to tear them down), and Twitter. After the brief announcement on the social network, the headlines# about the Twitter's IPO started flying is all kinds of directions. Of course, given we're talking about the market, the main consideration is profit. I do like Twitter Cards# for Web and mobile clients, the new way to attach media experiences to Tweets that link to your content. It will be available in 7 flavors. Twitter is not for everyone When we polled the... Read more →

The fourth of the 5 themes on the future of social is admittedly the one that interests me the most. This is where things get concrete and specific with operational execution -- we understand why we're doing this, we know who does what, and here is what the experience looks like. Visualize the social experience you engage in and provide as a prototype, regardless of the level of maturity you and your organization have reached in social. The minimum viable product could be: getting in the game -- figuring out how to break the "we're dabbling" impasse while at the... Read more →

We're fast approaching our conversation about the next big thing in social for customer service. See details here. Of the 5 themes on the future of social I've been thinking about based upon my research and work, this third one combines and builds upon the first two -- what customers want and the data overlord -- and focuses on harnessing the power of pull and push. Because it is both about what people discover through their direct experiences and those of their friends, as well as what brands promise, either directly through customer experience or loyalty program, and indirectly, through... Read more →

The second theme for our discussion on the future of social is dealing with data. With the ability to track everything -- both due to the growth of social networks online and users rapid technology adoption on and offline -- understanding what customers want is within reach. For this reason alone, big data has become the new shiny object in marketing. Whether that is a gold mine or a royal headache depends on the level of tech integration and analysis capabilities available to the organization. Think about the ability to track bodily functions and movement, home appliances, heating systems, television... Read more →

The news that Amazon's Bezos personally purchasing The Washington Post for $250 million is providing a strong example of the volume and range of opinions, information, and first hand experience accessible on the Interwebs. All content published freely by people close to the industry -- topped by Kara Swisher's eloquent open letter, which is being shared on all social networks, in itself indication that good journalism does not go out of style -- and readers close to the news organization. With paper product or not, The Washington Post still has plenty of brand equity and credibility. Borrowing the sentiment from... Read more →

Fresh from the news of a proposed merger between NY-based Omincom and French-native Publicis Groupe, we begin to see positive numbers for digital advertising. First things first, though. The two companies hold a big network of agencies each by and large focused on the ad business. In the Sunday OmniPub press conference, the rationale provided as a reason for merging was looking to combine forces to compete with Google and Facebook in the collection and utilization of data. Talk about change! As Ad Contrarian points out#, apparently, the advertising industry has decided that it is no longer in the creativity... Read more →